


take my memories, take my heart.

by cheshireanwriter



Category: TWICE (Band)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-13
Updated: 2019-12-30
Packaged: 2020-12-14 16:21:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,134
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21018692
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cheshireanwriter/pseuds/cheshireanwriter
Summary: Mina takes memories for a living, Momo takes lives.





	1. of glass and moonlight

Mina hadn’t always been known as the Black Swan.

To her friends, she was simply Myoui Mina. Nothing more, nothing less. To everyone else, however, she was a magician, a psychic, a powerful sorceress who had the ability to alter memories or erase them altogether. To everyone else, she was the infamous memory magician of Seoul, South Korea. The Black Swan.

“How could you betray me like this? After everything I’ve done for you?”

Mina sighed and took another sip of coffee, savoring the bitter aftertaste it left on her tongue. Black coffee was the best coffee, and nothing that anyone said would ever change her mind. Ever. “An indie cafe and the most renowned club in the country are two completely different things, Sana. I hope you know that.”

The woman in question scoffed loudly. “Yeah, it is. And you chose a dinky little coffee shop in the corner of Nobody street over your best friend’s club. Didn’t I tell you I’d get you free drinks and a VIP room?” She pointed an accusatory finger at her. “The only time you ever came to Eden was on opening day, and I literally had to kidnap you to get you there.”

“And that’s exactly why I never go,” she said, shuddering internally at the memory. “Also, free drinks don't equal good coffee, just like a VIP room doesn’t equal some peace and quiet for once in my life.”

“Yeah, yeah whatever, Grandma.” Sana took the seat across from her, slapping her phone on the table. 

Minatozaki Sana had always been loud. From the moment Mina had met her, she had known that she was someone who was born to be seen. She supposed that was why they were friends. Mina preferred the shadows where she could be hidden, and in Sana’s light, she could do exactly that. In return, she helped the woman shine brighter. It was a mutualistic relationship, whether Sana realized it or not.

Mina ignored the name-calling with a roll of her eyes. “How did you find me here, anyway? It’s not good for the two of us to be seen together, you know.”

Sana smirked and leaned forward. “What? Because we’re ex-girlfriends?”

“We literally lasted four and a half days, Sana. I wouldn’t call that a relationship.” Mina crossed her legs and leaned back in her seat. “And no one knows about that. Unless you’ve been running your mouth lately,” she said, leveling Sana with a pointed glare.

The club owner waved her hand dismissively. “Oh, chill out. I haven’t told anyone. I just think that Eve and the Black Swan has a nice ring to it, don’t you?”

Eve was the name that Sana had adopted simultaneously with her idea for Eden. It was ingenious, really, and people had flocked to this sinful version of paradise like demons to Hell. She thought it was funny, considering Sana resembled the demonic snake more than the innocent girl who was wrongfully deceived by it. Nevertheless, the rumors of her powers had further fueled the hype that came with the club’s grand opening and that was when Eve was truly born. 

Black Swan, on the other hand, was something a bit more sentimental. A reminder. Her clients seemed to enjoy it, sentimentality or not, and many commented on how it suited the mystery around her. She was content with it. 

“We weren’t  _ Eve and the Black Swan _ back then,” she said, tracing the grain of the table. “And I was talking about the fact that I erase people’s pasts and you tell people their future for a living. People might think that we're working together for profit, you know.”

“So? You can just erase their memory, no big deal.”

“Yes, because that’s exactly how it works.” Sana only offered her a cheeky wink that Mina ignored with a bite of her pastry. “But really. Why are you here?”

The coffee shop really was something small and indie, and it's only patrons at the moment was an old man sitting by the windows, and a teenage girl curled up in a corner by the bookshelves. Mina loved the peace that an atmosphere like this brought. She loved being able to blend into the background instead of standing in the center of a spotlight, even if it was only for a short while. She was proud of Sana, yes, but she couldn’t stand the energy of a club, especially not one of her size.

For once, Sana’s expression shifted into something serious. “You know, there’s been rumors going around lately.”

She shrugged, taking another sip of her coffee. It was beginning to go cold. “There’s always rumors. Especially in your club.”

“No,” Sana said, shaking her head. “This is different. People are…they’re talking about a bounty.”

She straightened in the chair, her attention abruptly focused on Sana. “A bounty? Here? On who?”

“That’s just it. No one’s really sure. Some people are saying it’s the Deity, Park Jihyo. Others are saying it’s the Blue Wolf, Chou Tzuyu.”

“What? Chou Tzuyu? Why would they want to kill her? She’s only a child.”

“Not to the Buried she’s not,” Sana said, voice brittle. “If you’ve got magic, especially Death magic like hers, you’re a threat. It’s always been that way. But Minari…” She exhaled, and it almost sounded shaky. Sana’s voice was never shaky. “Minari, they’re also saying—they’re also saying that it might be the Black Swan. They’re saying it might be you.”

A heavy silence fell between them. Sana was doing that thing where she tugged at the end of her hair when she was uncomfortable, and all Mina could think about was that she wanted to alleviate that. She didn’t like seeing the woman anything but obnoxiously flirty and effortlessly confident. 

So, she chuckled. “The bounty better be high. My net worth is in the hundred millions, you know.”

Sana’s eyes widened and she slammed her hand on the table, though luckily, Mina saw it coming and lifted her mug just in time. “I’m not joking, Mina! You could die. Like, really badly die.”

The old man and the girl glanced in their direction, and Mina shot them an apologetic smile that had them quickly looking away, then shot Sana a warning glance. 

“Did you even hear me right?” she hissed.

Mina shrugged. “I did. And if they decide to go through with it, I hope they’ll at least be creative.”

“What?” Sana practically spluttered. “Creative? Are you serious right now? You might be being targeted by the  _ Buried  _ and you’re talking about giving them points for creativity?”

“Well, what do you want me to do? Cry?” Mina finished the rest of her coffee, wincing slightly at how much it had cooled. “We knew what we were getting into when we decided to sell our magic, Sana. Don’t tell me you didn’t expect it.”

“Yeah, but—”

“And like you said, anyone who can use magic is a threat to them. Even children. We’re not children and we definitely haven’t been subtle about our powers.”

Sana frowned, though she didn’t look so tense anymore. “Still, you could at least be a little bit worried.”

“I am, but there’s no point in panicking.” Mina looked down at her watch and stood. “Thanks for worrying about me, really. I’ll be more careful. But I have to go, I have work to do. The client is a bit complicated this time.”

Sana perked up. “Oh? How much are you charging, then?”

“…Twelve thousand,” she said as she placed a five-dollar bill beneath the coaster.

Sana whistled. “Damn, that’s pretty pricey, even for you.”

“The client is in his mid-thirties and he wants to erase a memory from his childhood. You know the further I have to travel back, the more dangerous it is.” Sana nodded. “Also, Nayeon told him that he only has another forty or so years to live, but he said that he still wants to do it, so I’m guessing it really is something dangerous.”

“Must be one hell of a memory then, if he’s willing to give up, what, like half of his remaining life span?”

Mina hummed in agreement, flicking her fingers through her hair. She glanced at her watch once more, then patted Sana on the shoulder. “I have to go. I’ll see you around, Sana.”

“Not if you’re dead in a ditch somewhere,” she called out after her.

Mina only laughed. 

***

Mina’s penthouse lay on top of a twenty-story building in the midst of one of Seoul’s busiest streets. The view was spectacular, and she was high enough above the city that the sounds of car horns and sirens sounded about as loud as a muffled notification from a phone. To think that just six years ago she had been living in the alleyways with not a single place to call home. 

Truth be told, it hadn’t exactly been a struggle to get where she was now. The struggle had lain mainly in the decision to either publicize her magic and put herself in the limelight or to stay hidden in the shadows, nothing but another poor, abandoned girl.

She swirled the remaining wine in her glass, looking out of the spotless floor-to-ceiling length windows. She had turned all of the lights off so that she could see the city lights better, twinkling gently below her. Sometimes she imagined them to be stars.

She didn’t regret her decision, even though it may have spurred the bounty on her head. Like she’d said before, she had expected it. After all, it would be hard to ignore a nobody who abruptly rose to fame and fortune practically overnight, particularly when that certain nobody turned out to be a powerful magician, one who could manipulate a person’s memories seemingly at will, though that wasn’t exactly the case. 

The only thing that she couldn’t help but wonder was why Sana didn’t have any rumors about a bounty. The woman had left poverty along with her. They had both risen to the top at nearly the same time and Sana’s ability to look into people’s futures and alter them was just as powerful as her own. Mina had become the Black Swan and Sana had become Eve. So why was it that the rumored bounty wasn’t placed on her, too?

She sighed. Thinking too much was giving her a headache. She was out of wine, too. She padded to the kitchen to pour herself another glass. Just this one and then she’d sleep. She had a big day tomorrow, anyway. This client was quite clearly a desperate one and his story was something that Mina knew would trigger many a sleepless night. She wasn’t looking forward to it, even if she was receiving twelve grand in the process.

She turned back to the view of the city, wine in hand, only to see something sailing towards her window. At first, it seemed formless, a shadow against the background of artificial lights, but just before it hit the window, just before the life as she had known it would change forever, she realized what it was. A person.

The window shattered with an earsplitting crack, and Mina abandoned her wine and ducked behind the kitchen counter just as the glass shards began to fly. One hit the cupboard just beyond where she had been standing moments before, another hit the countertop opposite her, smashing into smaller fragments behind her. Frigid air rushed into the room and Mina began to shiver. Whether it was from the cold or the shock, she didn’t know.

A grunt of pain and a thud of a body hitting the ground accompanied the sounds of glass scattering across the floor. The intruder groaned and she could hear the telltale sound of them struggling to stand. It wasn’t a moment later that she heard something else, the rustling of clothes and the sound of boots lightly hitting the ground. Someone else was here.

“I suggest you stay down.” The voice was quite obviously feminine, smooth and composed. There was a certain rigidity behind it, however, that told her that whoever it belonged to wasn’t to be messed with.

“Come to hunt the swan, did you?” This voice was far rougher and clearly belonged to a man. “You’re strong for a pretty little girl like you. I wouldn’t mind working togeth—” His words were cut off by a pained grunt.

“I work alone.”

“Why you little—”

Chaos commenced. Mina winced as she heard the sound of ripping leather, and she knew that her couch was done for. Although, that probably should have been the last thing on her mind to be worried about. The bounty hunters were here. They were here, in her penthouse, fighting to win the honor of killing her. Fuck. She was actually going to die. She was actually going to be found dead in a ditch tomorrow morning. 

The sounds of fighting only became increasingly louder, and she closed her eyes, attempting to steady her heart. At least they wouldn’t be able to hear her hyperventilating. They were too busy trying to kill one another. As abruptly as everything had started, it stopped. She heard a dull thud and she imagined, this time, a body crumpling to the ground. Then, it was only the wind and the soft sound of labored breathing.

She couldn’t just sit here and wait to die. She had to at least see her murderer’s face. She had to at least try. Mina took a deep breath, mustering the last bit of courage she had, and finally peeked around the corner. Her window was far beyond repair, and as she’d expected, there was glass covering the floor of her living room, her couch, her coffee table. Well, at least she wouldn’t be alive to have to clean all that up.

Then, her eyes fell on  _ her _ . It was a girl. She was standing, almost ethereal among all the wreckage. The moonlight filtered onto her form, shoulders visibly rising and falling to the rhythm of her breaths as she stared down at the lifeless body of a man at least twice her size, laying in a pool of his own blood. 

She was wearing a black bodysuit with what looked like veins of red glowing within the fabric, and her hair, straight and the color of midnight, was tied in a high ponytail. A strange knife that curved like a crescent moon and mirrored the color of one dripped blood in her hand.

“Myoui Mina, you can come out now. I’m not here to hurt you.”

The girl said this without looking away from the body. Mina clenched her fists. Did she really expect her to believe that? After everything? After she murdered a man the size of a gorilla in her living room? She stayed put. As if she was going to listen to her. If she died, she wasn’t going to die like an imbecile.

“Behind the counter, on the left.”

Mina felt her limbs lock in place, her muscles so tense she thought they might snap if she so much as twitched. She swallowed, hard.  _ Fuck _ . There was no point in hiding now, and listening to the bounty hunter with the bloodstained knife seemed like the smarter choice, especially when the said bounty hunter knew exactly where she was. She slowly, painstakingly, stood up. Her legs refused to cooperate properly, and she grabbed onto the counter to stop herself from falling over and killing herself before the girl could even lay a hand on her.

The girl didn’t look at her right away. She continued to look down at the dead man on the ground silently. Then, just as slowly as Mina had gotten up, the girl finally looked at her. Her eyes were cold, emotionless, and they lacked the heat and bloodlust that Mina had thought she would see. But this. This was far, far more terrifying.

“You are the Black Swan, the memory magician?”

Mina swallowed again, willing her voice to work if nothing else. It did. Sort of. “Yes,” she managed to rasp out.

The girl seemed to study her for a moment before she nodded almost imperceptibly. “I’m not here to kill you,” she said, and for some reason, Mina believed her. She continued. “I just need you to erase my memory. All of it.”

Mina felt a familiar flare of rebellion in the pit of her stomach. This girl had broken her window, destroyed her couch, and scared her within an inch of her life, and she wanted her to use her magic for her? Risk her life for her?

She bit back as much of the indignation as she could. “Why should I?”

The girl’s expression didn’t change. She continued to look at her calmly, steadily, as if she had all the time in the world. It made her words that much more chilling. “Because if you don’t,” she said, her eyes locking into her own, “you’ll lose any little chance you have of making it out of this alive.”

It sounded like a threat. It was, wasn’t it? But the way she said it…something about it struck her as more of a warning. But why? Why would a bounty hunter warn her? Of anything? Before Mina could react, before she could so much as come up with a statement, a question, anything, the girl, amidst all the blood and glass and silver moonlight, fell to the floor, unconscious. 

Then, there was nothing but the wind.


	2. of death and magic

There was a dead man in her living room, stabbed in the gut by a knife that belonged to the unconscious woman lying not too far from him. 

The woman was bleeding from her right shoulder, and the blood pooled beneath her body like stagnant water—thick, viscous, crimson water. Mina had cautiously approached the carnage after a minute or two of standing, frozen, in unmitigated shock. From behind the counter, she hadn’t been able to see the slickness of blood running down the woman’s dark suit, especially not when her life was being threatened, but now, it was clear that she had been stabbed, too. Simply not in a vital area. Well, not vital enough to kill her instantly, anyway.

Mina brought her hands to her face and buried herself in them, breathing heavily. What in the world was she supposed to do right now? Call the police? Get rid of the dead body? Save the woman? Wait, no, why would she save the woman? She was trying to kill her, wasn’t she? She was a bounty hunter, someone who wanted her life for money. Right?

…No. No, she wasn’t. Mina knew she wasn’t. If the woman’s intention truly had been to kill her, Mina would have been dead by now. The woman wouldn’t have so much as blinked. She was sure of it. Besides, her words still rang in her ears, strange in the way it had been said, something in her tone.  _ Because if you don’t, you’ll lose any little chance you have of making it out of this alive. _ She still couldn’t shake it away. 

No, in all rationality, she had saved her if anything. The man, now dead on the ground had, without a doubt, been intent on ending her life. He had said it himself. He’d asked the woman to join him. The woman had refused—in a way. 

Whether that was true or not, the woman had saved her and Mina had to return the favor. She slowly dragged her hands away from her face and took a deep breath. Her eyes darted first to the dead, though she looked away just as quickly, and stared down at the woman instead. Her breathing was labored, and Mina could see the sweat shining on her forehead, brows furrowed in what clearly was pain. First things first. She had to patch her up.

Moving the woman to her bedroom wasn’t quite as difficult as she’d initially thought it would be. Despite the fact that she quite obviously had enough strength to take a six-foot tall man down and that she couldn’t be any shorter than she was, she was surprisingly light, and Mina had no problem carrying her in her arms. Blood now stained the front of her t-shirt and the cartoonish dog that had decorated the front looked demonic now. She’d have to throw it away. 

The suit wasn’t glowing anymore, except for the place where the woman had been stabbed, which shone red in the shape of what the cut would look like. Mina looked at it more closely and realized that the fabric had seemingly stitched itself back together. It even seemed to be constricting her arm, as if the suit was something alive, attempting to save the woman’s life, kind of like a loyal dog.

At least there wasn’t so much blood anymore. The suit had somehow staunched the flow, and the woman seemed to be breathing lighter, now, though Mina wasn’t sure whether that was a good thing or a bad thing. She just hoped that it didn’t mean that she was about to die. She didn’t think she could handle another dead body in her apartment.

Somewhere along the way, during her many years on the streets, she’d learned how to patch herself up. The streets had been dangerous—they still were—and there had been some nights that she’d had to stand up and throw a punch or two. Most nights, she’d simply run, and luckily, she’d always been a fast runner. 

She still had a scar across her knee from the time she hadn’t seen a crate in the way and had sunk her leg into the edge of it. Finding a needle and thread to sew it up had been hell, especially when she’d had to resort to hobbling around, but she’d managed it anyway. There had been a few other incidents after that, and she’d eventually become an expert at it. She’d had to.

Mina shook herself out of her memories and focused on the task at hand. She had to figure out how to get the woman out of her suit, first. She couldn’t help her when the fabric was in the way, even if it did seem to be helping her somehow. She cautiously reached towards where the suit was still glowing red on her shoulder, hoping to any god that might be listening that the suit wouldn’t electrocute her or something. 

Then, abruptly, the world was spinning and Mina found herself on her back, her breath caught in her chest, a hand pressed against her throat, the other pinned against her wrist, looking up into a pair of wild eyes, hazy and disoriented and scared. The look lasted a second, maybe even less, before the woman’s eyes cleared and the chilling impassiveness returned.

The woman’s voice sounded the same as her eyes looked. “What are you doing?”

Mina was human, she couldn’t ignore the fact that the woman was undoubtedly pretty, all tousled hair and danger in her eyes, and she couldn’t help but become aware of the position they were in, the way that she could feel the woman’s thighs along her hips, the way that her fingers shifted around her throat. It was borderline erotic, but she knew that one wrong move and it was entirely plausible that she’d be left with a snapped neck. It probably wasn’t what she should be focusing on at the moment.

“I was just trying to help you,” she said. Her voice came out soft, careful. “You’re bleeding. Or, at least, you were.”

She watched the way that the woman’s brows furrowed, a light touch of confusion, and she felt the tension in the hands at her throat and wrist slacken. “Why?”

“I would guess that it’s because you were stabbed,” she said. She couldn’t help the hint of a smile that tugged at the corners of her lips, though it quickly faded. “But if that’s not what you’re asking, then it’s because I owe you, whether that was your intention or not.”

The woman’s grip tightened around her wrist, but Mina could tell that it wasn’t out of malice. She suddenly looked lost, like a child who’d been left behind. “I don’t understand.”

She said the words as if she were hesitant, slowly and almost clumsily, quite unlike the way that she’d gracefully managed to pin Mina onto the bed, rendering her completely helpless in a heartbeat. 

“You saved my life, so I tried to save yours,” Mina said. She continued to search the woman’s eyes. “This world is all about giving and taking, and I don’t like being in debt.”

Silence settled for a moment. Then, “I could kill you.”

The woman’s words didn’t scare her as she knew it should have. “I know,” she said. She tilted her head. “Do you plan to?”

She knew the woman’s answer. She had said it before, and the woman didn’t look like the type to go back on her word, but Mina wanted to hear it again when the mask of indifference was off—the mask of a cold-blooded killer. 

The woman’s expression wavered, and for the first time, she looked away. “No, I don’t.” 

She was released as quickly as she’d been trapped. Mina blinked at the ceiling for a moment, then sat up to see the woman standing at the foot of her bed, her hand hovering over her injured shoulder.

“You should treat that.”

“I don’t have to.”

The fabric burned red again and Mina watched in amazement as the suit began to recede, leaving an opening where the woman’s hand lingered. Her eyes widened at the sight of a wound almost healed—a raw, pink scar the only remnant against alabaster skin. When the woman pulled away, the suit materialized back into place, inanimate once more.

“What kind of—”

“—is the body still there?”

Mina inhaled sharply. The body, of course. She’d almost forgotten about it. She swung her legs off the bed and nodded. The woman turned without a word and left the room, her footsteps so light she could barely hear it, even in the near silence. She followed her. The woman crouched next to the man’s body, and Mina watched as she reached out with steady fingers and placed her hand against his chest. Nothing happened for a moment, but she felt it in the air, something powerful, something compelling.

Then, she saw it. A gentle glow at first, and then a blinding flash of red that had her throwing her hands up to shield her eyes. When she opened them again, the body was gone. It was as if it had never been there, and the woman was standing, panting slightly, but otherwise unaffected. 

Mina stared at where the body had been, then slowly looked back up at the woman. “You have Death magic.”

The woman’s shoulders tensed. “I can only use it on the dead.” Her voice was stilted, almost staccato in the way that it jumped from one syllable to the next. Mina caught the way that her hand trembled, just slightly. “It can’t affect you.”

Death magic was rare, and the few who held its power were seen as cursed—murderers at best—Lucifer’s personal demons at worst. Those with Death magic were shunned and ostracized without mercy. It was clear that this woman had not been sheltered from those views, and Mina’s heart softened. Vulnerability.

She hummed. “I’m not worried.”

The woman didn’t turn, though she lowered her head. “You should be.”

It was then that Mina made up her mind. If she thought about it, she’d made it up long ago. This woman was someone to be cautious of, that was indisputable, but she wasn’t someone to be feared. Yes, she had the ability to kill her, perhaps even in less than a second, but she was certain now that she wouldn’t, not without a solid reason. The woman was a killer, but she wasn’t one without morals or a conscience. 

“Why? Because your magic has the word ‘death’ in it?” Mina dared to approach her, albeit slowly. “Death itself isn’t evil, you know. In many ways, it’s far more merciful than life.”

The woman finally turned around, and Mina saw a guarded look in her eyes, but also, a faint glimmer of hope, barely visible, but there all the same. “You’re strange.”

“Better strange than boring,” she said with a half-hearted shrug. She stood in front of the woman now, just a few feet apart. “Speaking of strange, I’ve been calling you  _ the Woman _ in my head for the past few hours. I’m not too creative with names, but I’m sure your real one’s better.”

“My name?” 

Mina raised her brows at the unexpectedly endearing awkwardness. It was as if no one had ever bothered to ask for her name before. Then, she realized, maybe no one ever had.

“Yes, your name. Unless bounty hunters don’t have one of those.”

The woman’s eyes darted to hers, dark and unreadable, but Mina could guess what she was thinking. “You’ve heard of the bounty.”

A wry chuckle escaped her. “…yeah, I have.”

“You don’t look afraid.” 

This time, it was Mina who looked away. “Being afraid won’t save my life. I’d rather accept it.” She looked down at her hands, all soft skin and delicate bones. Breakable. “I’ve never been a fighter, and I’m tired of running.”

The silence that fell over them was softer this time, gentler. 

“I’m known as many things.” The woman looked up at her, and Mina saw something resolute in her gaze. “But I prefer Momo.”

“Momo,” she repeated, tasting it on her lips. She smiled. “I think I prefer it, too.”

***

Sana wanted her head on a spike, and Mina didn’t think there would be anything left for the Buried to take once she was done with her.

“Is this some kind of sick joke?”

“I haven’t slept in twenty-four hours, I’m not exactly in the mood for jokes,” Mina said, shifting the phone from one ear to the other. “I’m surprised you’re awake.”

Sana scoffed, the sound harsh over the phone’s speaker. “So am I. But you only call me when something goes wrong. Of course, I picked up.” Her voice trailed off into an almost sleepy murmur, but Mina knew it was the embarrassment of displaying her emotions that softened it.

“What your employees would think if they heard you now,” Mina teased.

“Shut up.”

Sana ruled her club with an iron fist, and Mina knew that outside of their relationship, the woman was notorious as a goddess with a heart of stone. She was friendly enough to guests and dangerously enticing to clients, but she cut people with her wicked tongue and her gaze was sharp enough to pierce anyone into submission. Mina knew that she only did it to protect what little softness she had left. Sometimes she wondered if that softness was her.

Sana cleared her throat. “So, some dude and a girl crashed through your window. Which is on top of a twenty story building. Fine. Then what happened?”

“They fought, I hid behind the counter, she killed the man and then told me she wasn’t going to hurt me. She fainted because she got cut and lost a lot of blood, I tried to help her but then her strange suit healed her instead. Oh, and she made the dead man’s body disappear.” Mina picked off a piece of lint stubbornly clinging onto her sweater.

“…Why didn’t you tell me you’re writing a novel? You know I would support you.”

Mina fought the urge to roll her eyes. “If you weren’t going to believe me, why did you bother to ask me about it?”

“Oh, yeah, because if we switched places you wouldn’t have hung up on me ten minutes ago.”

Well, Mina couldn’t argue with that. Honestly, she would have hung up on her three words in and gone on with her day. “It’s true, though. Do you want me to send you a selfie with her?”

“A selfie? What are you—” For a second, there was nothing but breathing. Then, “No. No, you can’t be serious.”

“I’m always serious.”

“She’s still in your house. You made friends with her.”

“Well, not exactly friends, yet.”

“You can’t make friends with normal people,” Sana said, her voice deceptively calm. The deep intake of breath should have warned her. “But you can make friends with your  _ goddamn bounty hunter _ ?” 

Mina winced and jerked the phone away. It was a dirty trick, but she supposed she deserved it. After all, even she knew that her decision balanced somewhere between stupid and downright suicidal, admittedly leaning more towards the latter end. 

“I don’t think she’s a bounty hunter, and even if she is, she’s not a very good one.”

Sana’s laugh sounded borderline hysterical, and Mina wondered if she should be concerned. “Right, because literally flying through your window and killing a trained bounty hunter totally tells me ‘she’s not very good’. Are you actually trying to convince me that she’s harmless or something?”

Mina glanced through the gap between her bedroom door and watched as Momo scrubbed at one of the larger bloodstains on the floor. Her brows were furrowed in concentration, tongue poking out from the corner of her lips as she shifted her position to scrub even harder. It seemed to have worked because Mina caught a brief look of satisfaction on her face. Cute.

“Well, she’s doing the housework for me at the moment, so maybe.”

There was a brief silence and Mina knew what was coming. Sana didn’t disappoint. “You know what?” She switched to their mother tongue. “Die.”

The call ended. Sana said these things but never meant them, and Mina knew that the woman would show up at her door in the next few hours or so with a glare and a light slap to the shoulder prepared as punishment for annoying her. She’d always had a much shorter fuse than Mina did and their quarrels usually resulted in Sana cursing at her and Mina laughing at the clever ways she managed to insult her.

A scream pierced through the air that was quickly cut off, followed by a dull thump. Mina froze for a brief second before she sprang from her bed and rushed to the living room. Was there another bounty hunter? Already? If it was another bounty hunter, running out of her bedroom was a phenomenally stupid idea, but it was too late now. How were they getting in? 

Her apartment building didn’t allow anyone to enter the premises without a guest code. The security was top notch. Was it Sana? The moment the thought went through her head, she prayed for it to be a bounty hunter instead.

Mina froze in place the moment that she caught sight of Momo pinning someone to the front door, her knife poised to sink into the vulnerable flesh of the person’s neck at even the smallest wrong move. The person was quite obviously not Sana or even female. The smell of expensive cologne was pungent in the air and Mina was beginning to think that this intruder wasn’t really an intruder at all. 

For one, the person looked a bit too…well, out of shape to be a bounty hunter or an assassin, and for another, Mina could see the top of a gray, balding head peeking over Momo’s tense form. The woman turned at the sound of Mina’s footsteps, her expression emotionless in the way that Mina was starting to realize was her default when facing an adversary. Then, she saw the intruder’s face. Oh. Crap. 

“Hello, Mr. Lee. Are you here for the inspection?”

Well, she could stand to lose the apartment.


	3. of anger and attraction.

The landlord wasn’t pleased.

She couldn’t blame him. After all, she lived in the penthouse of his building and she’d still somehow managed to destroy it. 

A baseball couldn’t have done it, not even a major league batter could hit a ball with enough force to fly straight through a twenty-story window, and it wasn’t as if a plane had crashed through it either. There was also the small matter of the fact that he’d been greeted with a knife to the neck rather than a polite hello at eight in the morning.

Nevertheless, his respect for her paired with his kind-hearted nature allowed her to lie with almost natural ease—something about Momo being a friend from overseas who worked as security of sorts and then another lie about them waking up to the sound of shattering glass, but unable to find what had caused it. 

A simple freak accident.

People liked to listen to what they wanted to hear, and Mina knew for a fact that even if she told him the truth he wouldn’t have listened. Besides, Mr. Lee had lapped up her lie like a person dehydrated and had assured her that he would send a person to fix the window immediately. Manipulation wasn’t a favorite tactic of hers but she knew how to use it.

Anyway, that wasn’t her main concern at the moment. 

“Don’t you think it’s time that you told me  _ something _ about yourself?”

Momo sat perched on the edge of the kitchen chair, and though she seemed somewhat relaxed, there was a tension about her that never seemed to fade. It came with the field she supposed, the constant alertness, and Mina wondered if Momo was even aware of it.

“…what would you like to know?”

Her voice was hesitant despite how monotone it sounded, and Mina knew that she’d have to tread carefully if she wanted to receive the information that she wanted.

“Age? How old are you?”

Momo’s gaze lingered on the window. “Twenty-two.”

“Who are you?”

This time, Momo’s eyes flitted towards her, though only for a moment, before returning to the window. “A killer.”

Mina felt a thrill of fear course through her at the words, the way she said them as if it meant both nothing at all and everything there was all at once. She managed a small smile. “I said who, not what.”

Momo’s brows furrowed slightly though she continued to refuse to look at her. “Is there a difference?”

“What I am is a memory magician,” Mina said, shrugging. “Who I am, well…I guess that’s a hard question. Sorry.”

A gentle breeze flowed through the broken window, and Mina couldn’t help but admire the way that it played with Momo’s hair. The woman had let it down from her ponytail, allowing it to cascade down her back and frame her face. 

It made her look less like a professional and more like a college student or any young adult out there. Although she was admittedly a bit too pretty to be just an average person on the streets.

Finally, Momo turned towards her. “You’re in danger.”

“I had that somewhat figured out,” Mina said, allowing a smile to play at her lips.

“I can protect you. I just need you to erase my memories.”

Professionalism came rushing back and she couldn’t stop the way that her expression hardened. “You mentioned that. But erasing memories to that extent, it’s dangerous. It comes with a price.”

“If you don’t erase my memories, you’ll die.”

Mina gripped the armrest. “Is that a threat?”

The woman’s expression remained unchanged. “No, it’s a fact.”

“Why should I trust you? Why do you care?”

The look in Momo’s eyes was one of deep pain, so intense that Mina could almost feel it. She’d seen plenty of tortured gazes in her life, but none had ever been like this. There were no tears, but there was no need for them. 

“Because, I won’t be able to live with one more person’s blood on my hands.” Her voice dropped to a whisper, so quiet that it almost blended with the wind. “I can’t.”

Mina looked away, nails digging into the palms of her hands.

“Myoui Mina if you don’t open this door in the next five seconds, I swear to god I’m going to buy this apartment and kick your ass out!”

Momo had sprung to her feet with cat-like agility the moment that Sana’s voice had filtered through the door. She looked alarmed, and Mina couldn’t blame her. 

“Five!”

She rolled her eyes, standing up from the sofa. “Coming,” she called out.

“Four! Three!”

She pulled the door open and stepped back just as Sana swung at her, the handbag missing her by mere centimeters. There was murder in her eyes, and at that moment, she felt more afraid of her closest friend than the trained bounty hunter behind her. Sana grasped her by the collar of her shirt and yanked her forward until they were face-to-face.

“You better explain everything right here, right now, or someone’s gonna get hurt.”

This was something she hadn’t foreseen. Sana was undoubtedly far more hot-headed than she was—many people were—but usually, as fast as the flames appeared, they tended to die down just as quickly. This level of anger was one she hadn’t seen in a long time.

“Woah, okay, calm down for a second. I’d appreciate it if you didn’t break anything. Mr. Lee isn’t too pleased at the moment.”

“Oh, and you think I am?” Sana hissed.

Mina chuckled nervously. “Let’s not do this in front of the guest.”

That caught her off guard, just enough so that Mina could slip out of her grasp and put some much needed distance between them, although the look in her eyes changed her mind faster than she could blink.

“Oh, right, the  _ guest _ .”

Mina quickly threw herself in Sana’s line of sight, registering the danger in her tone. Professional assassin or not, she knew that her oldest and only friend would have no qualms about scratching out an eye or two. In all honesty, between Momo and Sana at this point, she wasn’t sure who would win if a fight were to break out.

“Can we all just sit down and talk about this? Like  _ civil  _ people?” Mina said, eyeing Sana carefully.

She chanced a glance back at Momo who looked about as relaxed as a coiled spring, her eyes not leaving Sana for a moment. She couldn’t handle much more of this. She was exhausted and the shock hadn’t really settled in yet, and Mina just wanted to lie down and forget about everything for a few hours.

She turned back to Sana and allowed her facade to crumble. Just a bit. “Sana, please.”

That was all it took for her to soften, the tension in the air fading away just like that. She knew that Sana would always put her well-being above anything else, even herself, and that the only reason that she was so angry was the thought of losing her. 

“Okay. Civil. I can do civil,” she said with a nod. “That is, if your  _ guest  _ would quit looking at me like she’s about to snap my neck.”

Mina wheeled around to see Momo still in her fighting stance, eyes trained on Sana and her body completely motionless. She wasn’t even sure if she was still breathing. 

“Momo, it’s alright. She’s a friend, no one dangerous. I’d appreciate it if you could relax.”

Dark eyes finally darted away from Sana to lock with her own, and Mina attempted to seem as calm as possible. It seemed to work. Momo posture gradually relaxed, though her gaze never left Sana for long, and she wordlessly nodded her agreement.

“Good. Now let’s all sit down,” she said, looking between the two women. “Please.”

Sana took the seat next to her on the couch and Momo returned to the kitchen chair, still perching at its edge, ready to jump into action at any moment. She almost laughed out loud at the situation they were in. If she was going to be honest, she wasn’t sure if she was even sane anymore. 

“So, you’re a bounty hunter.”

Mina almost choked on her own saliva, eyes wide as she considered whether or not to smack her best friend upside the head. She decided against it. The steely look in her eyes told her that nothing she did or said would change anything.

“No, not a bounty hunter.”

Mina swiveled around to look at the woman, eyes narrowed in confusion. “What are you saying? You told me—”

“—that I was a killer. I didn’t say I was a bounty hunter.”

“What? Then if you’re not a bounty hunter, what are you?” Sana said.

Momo looked away for a moment as if contemplating, then looked at Mina. “I’m what the Buried call the Forgotten. Which means that as far as the world knows, I don’t exist. We’re an elite force of assassins that they use for whatever they consider classified. My job was to kill you.”

Mina couldn’t help the shiver that ran up her spine at the chilling words. Knowing about the rumours was one thing, having them confirmed was another. The realization of how close she’d come to shaking hands with Death was slowly but surely beginning to sink in.

“So you kill her and no one would ever know who did it,” Sana growled. 

Momo shook her head almost imperceptibly. “No. No one would even know if she was alive or dead.”

Momo’s eyes told her something—something that Mina should know, something that she already knew. She just needed to put the pieces together. She came to the jarring conclusion a moment later.

“The elite have Death magic,” she said. Momo’s averted gaze confirmed her deduction. “The elite have Death magic so there wouldn’t be a record of a killing. It would be like they simply vanished into thin air.”

The silence that fell around them was suffocating. It was only broken by Sana’s disbelieving laugh. “Death magic? You use Death magic to just make people’s dead bodies disappear?” Her voice became increasingly agitated. “What about their friends? What about—”

Really, she should have seen this coming, should have seen it in the way that the woman’s breath caught in her throat and the way that her jaw twitched beneath her skin. 

Sana’s movements were too swift for Mina to comprehend, because she was beside her one second and throwing Momo onto the ground, landing punch after punch across her face the next. It took a moment for her to register what was happening before she lunged forward, wrapping her arms around Sana’s waist and dragging her back. 

With all the strength she could muster, she managed to swing her around and put herself between Momo and her best friend. Now they were back to square one again. Sana breathed as if she’d just ran a marathon, and Mina saw the red that was oozing from the broken skin on her knuckles. She was afraid to see the damage done on Momo.

The last time Mina had been forced to wrap her knuckles, they had still been nothing more than alley rats and Sana had saved her from a drunken man who’d managed to corner her behind a shady restaurant. 

She knew that if something like that happened now, the perpetrator would be found the next day beaten to an inch of his life and strung up on some pole in the middle of a busy intersection, Sana acting as innocent as a lamb.

Sana would do anything for the people she loved, and that was why the danger was so palpable now.

“Sana, you need to calm down,” Mina warned.

Sana’s voice was something that resembled a growl. “Get out of my way, Mina.”

“ _ Sana _ ,” she stressed, finally catching her attention, brown eyes hazy from the anger that Mina knew was boiling beneath her skin, bubbling in her veins. “She’s not the one who’s responsible. And you know that.”

Mina didn’t miss the flash of pain in her eyes before Sana turned away from her, but even without seeing it, she could tell by the trembling of her shoulders and her hands that were curled into fists too tight not to be painful.

Sana’s voice was hoarse as she let herself out of the apartment. “Sorry I couldn’t be civil, Minari.”

The sound of the door clicking shut was the last thing that echoed throughout the apartment before everything was silent again. Mina sighed and buried her face in her hands for a moment, trying to pull herself together. 

What had she done so wrong to deserve this? She’d simply wanted to get her and Sana off of the streets—the streets where even grown men were in danger, nevermind two young girls. She hadn’t done anything wrong. She hadn’t. And yet, here she was with a bounty on her head.

The assassin hadn’t moved from the spot that Sana had thrown her on. There was a bruise already flaming pink and purple on her cheek and Mina could see blood trickling down her chin from a cut on her lip. Momo didn’t look angry. She didn’t even look upset at the fact that Sana had beaten her like some dog on the street. In fact, she looked almost…relieved.

“Momo?”

“It’s okay.”

Mina frowned, crossing the room to carefully knelt down in front of her. “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize how much this would affect her. Sana isn’t usually…”

She paused as the scene replayed in her head—the way that Momo seemed to go limp in Sana’s grasp, the way that she didn’t so much as lift a finger to defend herself, nevermind fight back. She could have easily apprehended Sana, that much was certain, and Mina had no doubt that she had the skill to do so without hurting her.

“You wanted to get hit,” Mina murmured. “You  _ let  _ her hit you.”

Momo stared at her wordlessly then turned away. The expression on her face was unreadable, and Mina knew from experience with Sana that when someone had on such an expression, that it was easier to simply let it go—at least for the time being. She took in a deep breath and nodded, making her way to the kitchen in favor of continuing a pointless interrogation.

She pulled out an icepack from the freezer and wrapped it in a clean towel, then made her way to the bathroom to grab disinfectant wipes from the cabinet. She sat cross-legged in front of her and ripped open the wipe. This caught Momo’s attention, and this time, the shock was clear and undoubtedly legible, written in bold letters across her face.

“What—What are you doing?”

“What does it look like I’m doing?” Mina said, giving her a pointed look. “Now, stay still.”

Mina wasn’t sure if it was from the unexpectedness of her actions, but surprisingly, Momo didn’t move as she cupped her jaw and began gently wiping away at the dried blood that stubbornly clung to her skin. She pushed away anything that resembled thoughts from her head, willing her mind to simply go blank. She didn’t have the energy to think anymore.

She focused on other things, like the sharpness of Momo’s jaw, the feeling of the disinfectant wipe warming against her touch, the way that she could feel the woman’s shallow breaths against her face. She admired the flawlessness of her skin, and the plumpness of bloodied lips slightly parted…

“Mina?”

She startled and made the mistake of looking up into her eyes. Momo’s eyes were no less than captivating. It was like staring into the unknown—a frozen lake on a winter’s night or a starless midnight sky. Mina wasn’t sure what was wrong with her. 

Sana had always been the one who found beauty within people, which was why she’d created Eden in the first place. Mina, on the other hand, had never understood Sana’s desire to be surrounded by strangers. She preferred to be alone, to live inside her own head—which was ironic considering her job was to delve into the minds of other people, to see their deepest, darkest secrets.

So, this immediate and undeniable attraction she felt towards the person whom she’d thought was going to kill her not twelve hours ago was, for no better word, strange. It was strange, but it didn’t change the fact that it was there, whether she liked it or not.

“Sorry, sorry,” she said, clearing her throat. “Sleep deprivation does things to you.”

“Oh. You haven’t slept.”

“You should know,” Mina said, refocusing on the wound. “You haven’t slept, either.”

“It’s nothing I’m not used to.”

The woman didn’t so much as flinch even as she tended to the cut. Mina couldn’t help the wry laughter that escaped her. “Well, I don’t suppose being an assassin is a nine-to-five job.”

This time, she recoiled as if Mina had promptly slapped her across the face. Before she could apologize, Momo stood up, graceful in her movement, and she was once again reminded of how lethal the woman really was.

“You should get some rest.”

“Momo, I didn’t mean—”

“—I know,” she said, and for the first time, Mina saw the smallest hint of a smile on her lips. “Thank you for cleaning me up, I appreciate it. But you really should sleep.”

It was as if her words were the trigger her body needed to finally allow itself to feel the full extent of the fatigue that she’d been holding at bay for so long. Mina dragged a hand along her face, then nodded. It would be stupid to keep going at this rate—dangerous, even—especially when her thoughts were beginning to become muddled and her rationality was slowly but surely slipping away.

“You’re right. Sleep is a good idea,” she said, pushing herself up off the floor. “For  _ both _ of us. Even if you don’t have a nine-to-five job, you’re still human and you still need sleep.”

Mina could tell that she was about to protest, but they were both cut off by the sound of something bumping and clattering against the walls of the hallway, becoming progressively louder until it stopped just when it reached the door. Then, the irritated knocking began. It was a familiar rhythm by now and Mina didn’t hesitate to cross the room and open the door.

There stood Sana, sporting messy hair and rumpled clothes, panting from exertion. Mina frowned, then slowly looked down. Suitcases. Two large suitcases held captive in each of her hands. When she looked back up with shock in her eyes, Sana simply donned a devilish smile.

“What? You didn’t actually think you’d seen the last of me, did you?”


End file.
